Christian divorce

Christian Marriage and Divorce from a Jewish Perspective History I wanted to write a few short paragraphs of what the Bible said about divorce and why this understanding was so hard and challenging for the Gentiles coming to faith in Jesus. Gentiles did not look through the eyes of the Jews but of other egalitarian Gentiles. Therefore, this gives further reason as to why this teaching did not survive the test of time. Imagine if you will the destruction of Israel in 70 AD. The primarily Jewish council in Jerusalem, where James and the elders resided, dismantled and dispersed abroad. The Gentile Churches no longer having a central hub to ask questions are now forced to answer questions on their own. Without having a great understanding of marriage from its Jewish roots you could see why divorce and remarriage was such a debated subject in the first early years of Christianity. This writing is from a Jewish perspective using both New and Old Testament Scripture. Documentation shows that the Jewish people had primarily only allowed the man to initiate the divorce since the Torah. They still practice this today in the State of Israel according to Orthodox Jewish Rabbis. Christian scholars agree up to this point so far. But as I asked the question "why" the Jews only allowed man to initiate the divorce I was quite surprised with the answer. They gave the same reasons that us Christians use for teaching about headship and submission both in the home and in church leadership. As I looked further this is what I found. The Jewish leaders believed only the man was allowed to put away his wife for well... because Deut. 24:1 said so! When looking deeper in Jewish sources what I found is that this belief was based off their understanding of Gen. 3:16 and the role of woman and the rule of man. The understanding of man's unilateral divorce really stems from God's makeup, design and principles of marriage seen all throughout the Torah. Man typically paid a bridal price for a wife in Scripture. This practice was from the moral/ethical belief that a man leaves his father and mother and cleaves to his wife. The woman did not leave the home. The man had to request a wife from the home of her father which we still practice today. A suitor asks the father for his daughter's hand in marriage in which, if accepted, eventually walks her down the aisle symbolically "giving her away." Although payment was traditionally given to the father of the bride, the Orthodox Jews accept a gold wedding ring as a form of payment (Rebecca's gold nose ring) similar to our engagement ring. Many people believe these principles were the reasons the Church quickly embraced this type of marriage proposal by the man which formally came from possible pagan and Roman practices. Since the woman was designed to originally have a bridal price the Jews believed she was therefore "acquired" by the payment. Now, Jews and many other countries believed that the Bridal Price created the rights for a unilateral divorce that could only be initiated by the husband. Since the payment was a bilateral transaction between the groom and the father the contract simultaneously was able to create a "unilateral" marriage covenant between the man and his now purchased wife ("Which [Jesus] hath purchased with His own blood" Acts 20:28). Since the father had authority over his daughter after the financial transaction she legally/culturally could not refuse the proposal. The woman was not required and in many cases did not sign the marriage certificate but the father, groom and/or two witnesses. Traditionally, the daughter was not always asked by either the father or the groom for her consent or her hand in marriage. But Scripture suggests the father did ask her prior to the betrothal period and traditionally she drank the "wine of acceptance" before the betrothal was considered valid. Only in rare cases were the daughter's wishes not respected. The Jews and Israel still practices the "unilateral" marriage covenant and call it the Ketubah. The woman was not required to make vows of her own; she only had to accept his to enter into the marriage covenant. The contents of the marriage covenant were traditionally discussed and agreed by the father of the Bride and groom. The Ketubah was later written in the first century to offer the woman financial security after a divorce in lieu of the bridal price. The unilateral marriage covenant is common for most Jewish marriages today. The Jews have documentation that it has been practiced with very little change for 2,400 years. All in all, these symbols are the foundations and making of a marriage covenant and now the scripture of Deut. 24:1 supported it. Jesus paid a bridal price for the church (leaving us an example of a biblical marriage) and offered a unilateral covenant to the Church with one sided promises. Abraham was also offered a unilateral covenant by God (God went between the slain animals- not Abraham). In contrast, Scripture tells us the Jewish leaders went through the slain animals to enter into their "bilateral" covenant with God through Moses. This made the Mosaic Covenant of "Blessings and Cursing" different than Abraham's. Since our Covenant was one sided all we had to do was accept the covenant through faith to enter in much like Abraham. Jesus and Paul The New Testament supports the doctrine that only the man was allowed to initiate the divorce and not the woman. The Jews asked Jesus according to Deut. 24:1 if it was lawful for a "man" to put away his wife for any reason. Jesus did not answer their question directly but did say that Moses permitted it. Jesus told His disciples in private that if the man put away his wife for sexual immorality that he would not be guilty of adultery if he married another. Matthew’s gospel is written primarily to the Jewish audience and this is why the exception clause is mentioned here. 9 “And I say to you, whoever divorces his wife, except for sexual immorality, and marries another, commits adultery; and whoever marries her who is divorced commits adultery.”10 His disciples said to Him, “If such is the case of the man with his wife, it is better not to marry.” The reason Mark has an account of a woman putting away her husband in 10:12 is this book was a letter that was written to Gentiles living in Rome. Because it emphasized that this was a "private" account of Jesus we can understanding the author is speaking directly to the Gentile audience which allowed divorces initiated by a wife (evident by Harold marrying his brother Phillip's wife- Herodias probably divorced Phillip for Harold and other historical records). "10 When they were in the house again, the disciples asked Jesus about this. 11 He answered, “Anyone who divorces his wife and marries another woman commits adultery against her. 12 And if she divorces her husband and marries another man, she commits adultery.” We can also see further evidence that only the man was allowed to initiate the divorce by 1 Cor. 7:10-11. Paul said the departed wife is to "remain unmarried or to be reconciled to her husband." We now can understand that the reason Paul said a woman is not to depart from her husband, and if she did so not to marry another in 1 Cor. 7:10, 11a because the only way for a woman to depart from her husband was to do it outside of scriptural bounds. So, Paul wanted to make this point clear both with the particular Greek word that he chose to explain her divorce with and the very clear command (giving her only two options) of not allowing her to marry another. "10 Now to the married I command, yet not I but the Lord: A wife is not to depart from her husband. 11 But even if she does depart, let her remain unmarried or be reconciled to her husband. And a husband is not to divorce his wife." Paul spoke about Jesus' command saying the wife not to depart from her husband and the man not to divorce his wife in 1 Cor. 7:10-11. Since the woman was not allowed to divorce her husband, according to Scripture, Paul used the very common Greek word "depart" which comes from the same root word used by Jesus when He said, "Do not (separate or depart) what God has joined together." But, since the man was permitted in scripture to put away his wife for porneia, Paul used a more rare and formal Greek word not typically seen in the New Testament to describe a traditional style Roman divorce in their culture 1 Cor. 7:11b. Josephus used both of these Greek words in a story about a couple who was divorced. He showed that the "depart" word in Greek meant the general leaving or a more informal type of Greco-Roman divorce, while the "divorce" word similar to Paul's in 1 Cor. 7:11b was used by the Greek speaking Jews who wished to obtain a Get (Writ of Divorcement). "But some time afterward, when Salome happened to quarrel with Costobarus, she sent him a bill of divorce and dissolved (similar to “divorce” in 1 Cor. 7:11b, 12, 13) her marriage with him, though this was not according to the Jewish laws; for with us it is lawful for a husband to do so; but a wife; if she departs (similar to “departs” in 1 Cor. 7:10, 11a, 15a, 15b) from her husband, cannot of herself be married to another, unless her former husband put her away." (Josephus Ant. 15.7.10, 259) Since the man did have allowance for remarriage, Paul did not tell him to "remain unmarried or to be reconciled" as he did the wife in 1 Cor.7:11. But later said that a man "loosed" from his previously "bound" wife will not sin if he marries, and a virgin marrying will not sin (1 Cor. 7:27-28). "26 I suppose therefore that this is good because of the present distress—that it is good for a man to remain as he is: 27 Are you bound to a wife? Do not seek to be loosed. Are you loosed from a wife? Do not seek a wife. 28 But even if you do marry, you have not sinned; and if a virgin marries, she has not sinned..." The reason Paul uses the formal Greek word for divorce again in both 1 Cor. 7:12 and verse 13 is, being that it was evident that the women had an improper understanding of gender equality in this church (1 Cor. 11:2-16 and 1 Cor. 14:34-36), the women obviously must have felt that they had every right to divorce as a man in certain Scriptural mandated situations. "12 To the rest I say this (I, not the Lord): If any brother has a wife who is not a believer and she is willing to live with him, he must not divorce her. 13 And if a woman has a husband who is not a believer and he is willing to live with her, she must not divorce him." So, when the question about the Law of Ezra 10:3 came up among these believers the women thought they could use, or commanded to obey, this Law as a means to put away their unbelieving husband as the men were told to put away their unbelieving wife to keep the seed pure. "14 For the unbelieving husband is sanctified by the wife, and the unbelieving wife is sanctified by the husband; otherwise your children would be unclean, but now they are holy." 1 Cor. 7:12-15 was the Corinthian's understanding and application of the Law of Ezra 10:3. Those Jews were commanded to put away their forbidden wife and the unclean children that were born unto them. We know this is in reference to Ezra 10:3 because Paul says in 1 Cor.7:14 that the children would otherwise be "unclean" but now they are holy. The believers were later told to separate from the unbelievers and not to be "unequally yoked" together 2 Cor. 6. But even with this general understanding (not to touch the unbelievers) already populating the Corinthian Church, Paul said if the unbeliever wished to stay married than stay married to them. 1 Cor. 7:15 "depart" (same word used by Paul in 1 Cor. 7:10-11a) is in the present tense which demonstrates that the only allowance for a believer to divorce an unbeliever is if the unbeliever has already initiated the divorce process according to their cultural laws. By Paul using the Greek word "depart" in 1 Cor. 7:15a, he was demonstrating to the believer that he was authorizing the divorce even if it was for unlawful reasons. "15 But if the unbeliever departs, let him depart; a brother or a sister is not under bondage in such cases. But God has called us to peace. 16 For how do you know, O wife, whether you will save your husband? Or how do you know, O husband, whether you will save your wife?" Paul responds by commanding the believer not to fight or restrain the divorce but to give them this unlawful divorce even if previously directed not to (shown in 1 Cor. 7:10-11). And this is why Paul said that they are no-longer in bondage to the Law of Moses but rather to be at peace with them by honoring their request (1 Cor. 7:15c). The Law was typically referred to as bondage or slavery by Paul (Gal. 4). Paul ends by giving a logical argument in verse 16 by explaining to the believer that we can never know if holding onto the marriage would ever lead to their spouse being converted. Reference: Calvin College Computer Science website. The Christian Classic Eternal Library, CHAPTER 7. HOW HEROD SLEW SOHEMUS AND MARIAMNE AND AFTERWARD ALEXANDRA AND COSTOBARUS, AND HIS MOST INTIMATE FRIENDS, AND AT LAST THE SONS OF BABBAS ALSO. Retrieved Sept. 23, 2016 from http://www.ccel.org/ccel/josephus/complete.ii.xvi.vii.html God bless you all!